(40)  Michael John Copinger

Born at The Red House, Roe Green, Kingsbury, N.W.9. the only son of Charles Edward deRoscoff Copinger and his wife Dorothy on 30th April 1921, Michael had two elder sisters, Monica Mary and Priscilla Joan.  He was educated at The Hall, Cheshunt, and at Haileybury where he missed a year's schooling due to serious illness.

In 1939, by examination, Michael obtained the Instructors Certificate of the Institute of the Horse (now the British Horse Society) in "Equitation, Training the Young Horse, and Stable Management."  According to himself this was the only exam he could ever pass because it was the only subject that interested him.  Although he no longer hunts, his love of horses, hounds and fox-hunting remains undiminished.

Due to his earlier serious illness he was unfit for service during the second world war but spent three years in the Home Guard.  Michael's working life was spent in the brewing industry from which he retired early, in 1976, by his own admission, in order to do nothing.